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DANCE HALLS, MASQUERADES, BODY PROTEST AND THE LAW: THE FEMALE BODY AS A REDEMPTIVE TOOL AGAINST TRINIDAD’S GENDER-BIASED LAWS

MICHÈLE ALEXANDRE*

I. INTRODUCTION

Male domination of the female body is the basic material reality of women’s lives; and all struggle for dignity and self-determination is rooted in the struggle for actual control of one’s own body . . . .1

The very word erotic comes from the Greek word eros, the personification of love in all its aspects─born of Chaos, and personifying creative power and harmony. When I speak of the erotic, then, I speak of it as an assertion of the lifeforce of women; of that creativity energy empowered, the knowledge and use of which we are now reclaiming in our language, our history, our dancing, our loving, our work, our lives.2 Aristophanes’ play, Lysistrata, tells of a group of women who withhold sex from their husbands until their husbands make peace with the Spartans.3 This simple story creates a powerful image of these women’s awareness of their bodies’ inherent power. This awareness, arguably, pushes them to present the body as a tool capable of triggering change. While this may, at first glance, seem a story of manipulation, it is actually a celebration of the power and redemptive qualities of women’s bodies. The female body has long been the subject of awe, shame, and controversy. Women who have expressed themselves through their bodies have traditionally been typecast as loose and oversexed by both men and women alike. Such

* Assistant Professor of Law at The University of Memphis, Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law; B.A. Colgate University, J.D. Harvard Law School. The author thanks the Fulbright Foundation for its support and for facilitating the rewarding and fulfilling academic and cultural exchange that was her Fulbright Fellowship. The author also thanks Dr. Patricia Mohammed, Imani Perry, Dr. Rhoda Reddock, Janet Richards, Kindaka Sanders, Kevin Smith, and Yao Sores for their comments and support. Finally, the author thanks her student research assistant, Ms. Vanessa Cross. This article gained much from presenting it at the University of West Indies’ Centre for Gender and Development Studies’ Luncheon Seminars, at the Second Annual People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference held at the George Washington University Law School and at the Feminist Legal Theory Conference held at John Marshall University, on February 19, 2005. 1. ANDREA DWORKIN, PORNOGRAPHY: MEN POSSESSING WOMEN 203 (E. P. Dutton 1989) (1979). 2. AUDRE LORDE, Uses of the Erotic, in SISTER OUTSIDER 53, 55 (1984). 3. See ARISTOPHANES, LYSISTRATA (Douglass Parker trans., Signet Classic 1970) (centering around a group of women in Athens led by Lysistrata who, outraged at having lost their sons to war, agree to deny their husbands sexual intercourse until they make peace with the Spartans).

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178 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 judgment is symptomatic of the existence of “sexual profiling” in all cultures. In this article, sexual profiling refers to the assumptions made regarding women who express themselves through their bodies. Social stereotypes regarding “morality” are generally used to evaluate women’s behaviors and justify sexual profiling. An analysis of the effects of sexual profiling on female bodily expression reveals that laws and social constructs conspire to restrict women’s autonomy and freedom of expression. Moreover, sexual profiling has even impacted feminist jurisprudence’s view of female bodily expression. This impact is evidenced by the fact that, thus far, feminist jurisprudence has neglected to embrace the female body as a tool for redemption and liberation. However, such an omission has not derailed female bodily expression. In all cultures there are women who use their bodies to fight patriarchy and resist gender-biased laws and assumptions. Therefore, this article argues that feminist jurisprudence must identify women’s bodies as tools for redemption against sexism and patriarchy. This article uses Trinidad as an example of a society in which patriarchal laws that control women’s bodies abound.4 Specific Trinidadian laws perpetuate society’s widespread stereotypes of women’s bodies and continue the tacit sexual profiling of women. Despite these disadvantages, poor women in Trinidad have used and continue to use the body as a tool for resistance. Trinidadian women’s use of their bodies to fight patriarchy is referred to in this article as “body protest.” The term “body protest” is coined here to describe women’s use of the female body as a mode of expression and as a tool for liberation and transformation. If we “read” these women’s bodies, we witness an organic feminism that should lead us (academic feminists) to recognize our own internalized sexism and our limitations in arguing for women’s liberation. Trinidadian women lead us to a deeper understanding of the role of the body in gender liberation. This article attempts to further the feminist discourse by demonstrating how embracing the female body as a redemptive tool can lead to a more liberated, inclusive and effective feminist movement. This article consists of six parts. The first part explores the concept of body protest. The second part provides a history of the traditional stereotypes attached to women’s bodies and discusses the effects of body politics on women. The third part consists of an assessment of feminist theory’s treatment of the female body. The fourth part deals with Trinidadian women’s use of their bodies to reverse gender constructs and explores how body politics in Trinidad should inform potential legal reforms. Finally, the fifth and sixth parts discuss the lack of protection provided by Trinidadian jurisprudence to Trinidadian women and incorporate a proposal for women-centric legal reforms in Trinidadian law.

II. BODY PROTEST DEFINED This article explores body protest, its manifestations and the challenges that its practitioners face. Body protest consists of the use of women’s bodies by

4. This paper concentrates on women’s struggle in an international setting to illustrate the need for international coalition-building among women. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 179 women to challenge gender restrictions and to activate women-centric legal reforms.5 It also encompasses the therapeutic goals of asserting dominance over one’s body and of facilitating one’s expression of womanhood in revolt against a patriarchal society. Instances of body protest include, but are not limited to, women’s use of their bodies through dance, dressing, performance arts, etc. For example, certain women choose to dance suggestively, dress contrary to societal standards of propriety, perform sexually explicit artistic roles, bring attention to specific body parts, and adopt sexually explicit personas in order to highlight the societal restraints imposed on them. The non-legitimization of body protest by feminist jurisprudence is directly related to stereotypes associated with the employ of the female body. These stereotypes hinder potentially beneficial uses of the female body by designating many of its liberating functions as immoral. The societal attitudes engendered by these stereotypes also explain the legal system’s reluctance to protect body protest. This lack of protection, consequently, leaves women who choose this valuable form of resistance unprotected and vulnerable. An exploration of body protest reveals the existing diversity inherent in women’s experiences and struggles. This diversity benefits rather than harms feminist jurisprudence. A more inclusive feminist jurisprudence will result from the inclusion of these organic feminists’ remedies. These organic feminists can also join forces with academic feminists to form a stronger task force against patriarchy. Recognizing body protest as a feminist endeavor is not without its challenges. It requires accepting the possibility that women’s experiences and struggles do not always fit in the already established feminist categories. Still, analyzing the reasons that motivate body protest will also provide feminist jurisprudence with a clearer understanding of the tacit ways in which law oppresses women. Body protest is organic feminists’ response to the widespread sexual profiling that they encounter daily in the social, political and familial spheres of their lives. Feminists must realize the entrenchment of sexual profiling in these spheres in order to effectively combat patriarchy. As suggested by Moira Gatens: [F]eminists have offered little by way of a coherent theory of the body. In particular, there has been little critical work done on the conceptual dimension of the relations between women’s bodies and the state: between the body of woman and the body politic. In the absence of such theory, it is culturally dominant conceptions of the body that, unconsciously, many feminists work with.6 It is time for a deeper understanding by feminist jurisprudence of how dominant conceptions continue to oppress women. Such new understanding

5. Body protest also might fall under critical legal studies’ notion of flipping or “[a]ppropriating the central idea of your opponent’s argument-bite and claiming that it leads to just the opposite result from the one she proposes.” Duncan Kennedy, A Semiotics of Legal Argument, 42 SYRACUSE L. REV. 75, 87 (1991). This article, however, argues that organic feminists, as exemplified by certain Trinidadian women, go beyond flipping the patriarchal structure by actively questioning and combating it through the deliberate use of their bodies. 6. See generally Rose Weitz, A History of Women’s Bodies, in THE POLITICS OF WOMEN’S BODIES 3 (Rose Weitz ed., 2d ed. 2003), for similar argument. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

180 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 will then allow feminist jurisprudence to combat gender-biased rules more effectively.

III. HISTORY OF THE TRADITIONAL CLASSIFICATIONS OF THE FEMALE BODY Sexual profiling is rooted in the gender stereotypes historically associated with women’s bodies. The belief in the inferiority of women’s bodies dates as far back as biblical writings.7 An analysis of Aristotle’s writings,8 for example, reveals an interpretation of woman as a “misbegotten man” who, because of lack of heat, did not become fully human.9 Beliefs regarding women’s physical or genetic inferiority translated into beliefs in women’s psychological and mental inferiority. Biblical stories portrayed women as weak-willed temptresses susceptible to sexual temptations. For example, according to Rose Weitz, Eve is blamed in Genesis for the fall of humankind in the eyes of the Creator and for the attachment of original sin to the human race.10 Women’s lower standing in society was, thus, justified by their presumed lack of intelligence and lack of reason. While women have historically received very little protection from the law, enslaved African women received no protection at all. The law viewed them as property, while society viewed them as beasts and animals. Enslaved African women were entirely the physical and sexual subjects of their owners. The rapes of African-American women were justified by rhetoric labeling them as “animalistically hypersexual” and, thus, “responsible for their own rapes.”11 Vestiges of these repressive views of women’s bodies still remain not only in men’s and women’s psyches but also in societal norms and in legal concepts. For example, the United States, which purports to have achieved the greatest strides in the struggle for women’s rights, still grapples with the idea of an autonomous female body. Debates over women’s rights to abortions, as well as documented interference with black women’s reproductive and parental rights, speak volumes about the attempts to subjugate the female body.12 In her denouncement of governmental restrictions on black women’s reproductive rights, Dorothy Roberts analyzes the roots of stereotypes associated with black female bodies, finding that many of them originate in slavery. According to Roberts, “the licentious Jezebel; the careless, incompetent mother; the domineering matriarch; and the lazy welfare mother [are images that] have reinforced and legitimated [black mothers’] devaluation.”13 During the period of

7. See id. 8. ARISTOTLE, THE GENERATION OF ANIMALS 716A4-9 (A. L. Peck ed. & trans., Harvard Univ. Press rev. ed. 1953), available at http://duke.usask.ca/~niallm/233/Aristotl.htm, (“As we said one can easily identify the causes of birth as the male and the female, the male as the cause of change and development, the female as the supplier of the material.”). 9. Weitz, supra note 6, at 3. 10. Id. at 4. 11. Id. at 4-5. 12. See generally, e.g., DOROTHY ROBERTS, KILLING THE BLACK BODY: RACE, REPRODUCTION AND THE MEANING OF LIBERTY (1997); DOROTHY ROBERTS, SHATTERED BONDS: THE COLOR OF CHILD WELFARE (2002). 13. Dorothy E. Roberts, Punishing Drug Addicts Who Have Babies, 104 HARV. L. REV. 1419, 1437 (1991). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 181 slavery, black women were the victims of the most self-annihilating contradiction: slave owners capitalized on black women’s reproductive abilities while constantly defaming their bodies. That contradiction is poignantly exemplified by the method used to punish pregnant slaves. It was the custom for: Slave owners [to] force women to lie face down in a depression in the ground while they were whipped, thus allowing the [slave owner] to protect the fetus while abusing the mother. It serves as a powerful metaphor for the evils of a fetal protection policy that denies the humanity of the mother. . . . It is also a forceful symbol of the convergent oppressions inflicted on slave women: they were subjugated at once both as blacks and as females.14 In view of these negative classifications of black women, it is not surprising that black women progressively migrated toward the opposite view, a view that presented them as more virtuous, chaste and genteel and did not leave them susceptible to physical and spiritual denigration. Although reactionary, this adoption of a more Victorian and European idea of virtue, at the very least, put the rest of the world on notice that these stereotypes of black women would not be tolerated. “Judged by the evolving nineteenth-century ideology of femininity, which emphasized women’s roles as nurturing mothers and gentle companions and housekeepers for their husbands, [b]lack women were practically anomalies.”15 Today, black women are not simply viewed as being promiscuous beasts of burden, but must contend with modern stereotypes. Shows like the “Jerry Springer Show” and the “Maury Povich Show” capitalize on some women’s economic despair and social challenges to deliberately depict poor black women as morally loose and unfit parents.16 At no time do these shows ever analyze the socio-economic elements affecting these women’s lives. Instead, these women are presented to the public as caricatures and as objects of the public’s moral judgment. Regina Austin captures some of the pejorative characterizations of black women in Sapphire Bound!, where she states: “I grew up thinking that Sapphire was merely a

14. Id. at 1438. 15. ANGELA Y. DAVIS, WOMEN, RACE & CLASS 5 (1981); see PAULA GIDDINGS, WHEN AND WHERE I ENTER: THE IMPACT OF BLACK WOMEN ON RACE AND SEX IN AMERICA 37 (1984) (reviewing the negative stereotypes held in relation to Black women and the intersection of race and class in Black women’s status in America); see also A. LEON HIGGINBOTHAM, JR., IN THE MATTER OF COLOR 40-47 (1978) (discussing society’s historical negative perception of black women). 16. The Maury Povich and Jerry Springer shows frequently center around black women who do not know the paternity of their children. A typical show introduces black women as guests who are unsure of the paternity of their children. Paternity tests are conducted on two, three, or four contenders associated with each woman. (While both shows periodically conduct paternity tests, The Maury Povich show seems to conduct them more frequently). The audience waits breathlessly to find out whether these allegedly promiscuous and unethical black women will be able to determine the identity of their children’s fathers. The ultimate shame comes when, after the tests, none of the male contenders is found to be the father. These narratives and other variations of them (similarly questioning black women’s morals) are repeated endlessly over the fifty-two weeks of the year that these shows air. Maury Povich’s and Jerry Springer’s shows are not the only ones that present black women in that fashion. They only exemplify a common pattern in daytime television and society. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

182 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 character on Amos ‘n’ Andy,17 a figment of a white man’s racist, comic imagination. Little did I know that Sapphire was a more generally employed appellation for the stereotypical black bitch―tough, domineering, emasculating, strident and shrill.”18 For black women, liberation from the weight of these negative characterizations is sometimes challenging. For some, the energy exerted to negate these stereotypes results in their internalization. Consequently, the use of the body as a liberating force and as a way to assert rights generally receives mixed reception from feminist scholars as well as grassroots organizers.

IV. CRITIQUE OF FEMINIST THEORY’S TREATMENT OF THE FEMALE BODY Feminist theorists have explored the social construction of women’s bodies extensively.19 More particularly, feminist discourses on the body have denounced patriarchal oppression and invasion of women’s bodies and the perpetuation of the superior/inferior dichotomy.20 Nonetheless, feminist discourse has been extremely conflicted on the idea of the body as a tool for renegotiating gender roles. While most feminists would acknowledge the traditional use of sex to oppress and dominate women,21 very few of them give real credence to female bodily expression as a successful and useful conduit for negotiating gender classifications. However, over the past decades, some feminists have questioned their traditional analysis of heterosexuality, prostitution,22 and pornography by suggesting the possibility of agency in

17. See NEW DICTIONARY OF AMERICAN SLANG 368 (Robert L. Chapman ed., 1986) (defining “sapphire” both as an unattractive black woman and the name of a character on Amos n’ Andy). “Amos ‘n’ Andy” originated as a radio comedy program about two black males. BART ANDREWS & AHRGUS JULLIARD, HOLY MACKEREL! THE AMOS AND ANDY STORY 16 (1986). It was first broadcast in 1951, with a cast of carefully chosen black actors. See id. at 45-49, 60-61. Various black civil rights organizations condemned the television version as “fostering racial stereotypes.” David Schutz, The Original Amos ‘n’ Andy Webpage: History, http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/2587 (last visited Jan. 11, 2006). As the fight against racial discrimination heated up, sponsors became increasingly wary of associating their products with black entertainers—this fear of association in conjunction with criticism of the show’s depiction of black Americans led the network to drop the show in 1953. PAM DEANE, THE MUSEUM OF BROADCAST COMMC’NS, AMOS ‘N’ ANDY SHOW, http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/A/htmlA/amosnandy/amosnandy.htm (last visited Jan. 11, 2006). 18. Regina Austin, Sapphire Bound!, 1989 WIS. L. REV. 539, 540 (1989); see also BELL HOOKS, AIN’T I A WOMAN 85-86 (1981); see also Patricia Bell Scott, Debunking Sapphire: Toward A Non-Racist and Non- Sexist Social Science, in ALL THE WOMEN ARE WHITE, ALL THE BLACKS ARE MEN, BUT SOME OF US ARE BRAVE 85 (Gloria T. Hull, Patricia Bell Scott & Barbara Smith eds., 1982). 19. See Weitz, supra note 6, at 9. 20. See id. (discussing the social construction of the female body and promotion of women as inferior to men). 21. See e.g., CATHARINE A. MACKINNON, TOWARD A FEMINIST THEORY OF THE STATE 215, 215-36 (1989); CATHERINE A. MACKINNON, FEMINISM UNMODIFIED (1987). 22. See generally Priscilla Alexander, Prostitution: A Difficult Issue for Feminists, in SEX WORK (Frederique Delacoste & Priscilla Alexander, eds., 1987), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW 962-70 (Judith G. Greenberg, Dorothy E. Roberts & Martha L. Minow eds., 2d ed. 1998) [hereinafter WOMEN AND THE LAW] (discussing traditional feminists’ perceptions of sex workers as tools and prostitution as illegitimate); see also Priscilla Alexander, Making a Living: Women Who Go Out, in WOMEN’S EXPERIENCE WITH HIV/AIDS 75 (Lynellyn D. Long & E. Maxine Ankrah eds., 1996) (discussing numerous aspects of prostitutes’ lives and issues in a global report that includes information about 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 183 certain circumstances. These feminist argue that it is possible for women to voluntarily choose to participate in heterosexuality and pornography without being the victim of false consciousness and patriarchy. Critics of anti- prostitution movements have also stated that laws designed to eradicate prostitution are inadequately enforced and perpetuate the oppression of prostitute women. As a result, the legal rules enacted to protect these women have made them even more vulnerable to harassment by pimps, customers, and police alike. Priscilla Alexander finds that the failure of the anti-prostitution movement stems from its conviction that prostitution is illegitimate. She argues that: If law enforcement is designed to reduce the amount of prostitution, it has failed miserably . . . . Forced prostitution cannot be addressed until voluntary prostitution is legitimate. Feminists’ attempts to simply stop it, and to ‘rescue’ the women who have been so badly abused, are doomed to fail until the laws that punish prostitutes are abolished and businesses that employ them are regulated . . . .23 Priscilla Alexander’s statement illustrates the tension among feminists regarding prostitution and pornography. Disagreements with anti-prostitution and anti-pornography movements generally address the inadequacy of the laws regulating the industries rather than advocating the redemptive potential of body use by women.24 Gail Pheterson exposes the underlying reason for this when describing the interactions and non-interactions between feminists and sex workers:25 “Sex workers were rarely visible at feminists meetings. Given the dominance of abolitionist feminism during the late 1970s and early 80s, those feminists with either histories or present jobs in prostitution were careful to conceal their ‘politically incorrect’ occupation.”26 Thus, fear of judgment from fellow feminists caused these past or present sex workers to hide their occupation and work separately. Anti-prostitution activists’ failure to address the complex nature of prostitution and to center the debate on the protected nature of prostitutes’ use of their bodies created a schism in the feminist movement and excluded potential sympathizers, thereby weakening the fight

working conditions and health); Priscilla Alexander, Prostitution Around the World (1993) (unpublished database, on file with the San Francisco Public Library) (including information about laws, enforcement practices and issues regarding mandatory testing for a wide range of countries around the globe, survey forms and related materials); Priscilla Alexander, Sex Workers Fight Against AIDS: An International Perspective, in WOMEN RESISTING AIDS: FEMINIST STRATEGIES OF EMPOWERMENT 99, 99-123 (Beth E. Schneider & Nancy E. Stroller eds., 1995) (discussing how AIDS discourse is changing as a result of the active involvement in the struggle to prevent AIDS). 23. Alexander, Prostitution: A Difficult Issue for Feminists, reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 968. 24. See PATRICIA HILL COLLINS, BLACK FEMINIST THOUGHT (1991), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 1025, 1025-36; Andrea Dworkin, Against the Male Flood: Censorship, Pornography and Equality, 8 HARV. WOMEN’S L.J. 1, 1-29 (1985); Carlin Myer, Sex, Sin, and Women’s Liberation: Against Porn-Suppression, 72 TEX. L. REV. 1097, 1097-1201 (1994); MARIANA VALVERDE, SEX, POWER AND PLEASURE 121, 121-45 (1987), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 1059, 1059-65. 25. “Sex workers” is a term that refers to persons whose profession provides types of sexual services. 26. Gail Pheterson, Not Repeating History, in A VINDICATION OF THE RIGHTS OF WHORES 3, 18 (Gail Pheterson ed., 1989). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

184 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 for women’s rights.27 Gail Pheterson describes a number of conflicts, such as Kathleen Barry’s refusal to participate in a televised roundtable on sexual slavery with a prostitute or ex-prostitute.28 However, the fact that some feminists and sex workers have finally teamed up to demand human rights protections for prostitutes and have even published a statement on prostitution and human rights,29 provides hope that there can and will be future alliances among women of varied social, economic, educational, and philosophical backgrounds. The inclusion of personal and authentic narratives from specific women’s lives serves to humanize the continuing struggle for equality. Feminist legal theory should focus not only on women’s suffering and pain but also on their stories of resistance and triumph. The deliberate inclusion of women’s narratives of resistance through the use of their bodies (as is often illustrated by body protest) in feminist legal theory will require a suspension of moral judgment on the part of traditional feminists. Such suspension necessitates a restraint from quick accusations of “false consciousness” and an understanding of the diversity of women’s cultures and realities. Robin West explains false consciousness: As feminists know all too well, it is not just the legal culture which trivializes women’s suffering, women do so also . . . an injury uniquely sustained by a disempowered group will lack a name, a history and in general a linguistic reality. Consequently, the victim as well as the perpetrator will transform the pain into something else, such as, for example, punishment, or flattery or transcendence, or unconscious pleasure. A victim’s response to an injury which is perceived by the victim as deservedly punitive, consensual, natural, subconsciously desired, legally inevitable, or trivial will be different from a response to an injury which is perceived as simply painful.30 There is no denying that false consciousness occurs. Nonetheless, labeling female bodily expression as a product of false consciousness confuses the real issues and attempts to make women’s actions fit into neatly established feminist categories. This article calls for a reevaluation of these categories. Doing so does not, in any way, negate the existence of oppressive structures for women. The reevaluation of these categories does not dilute the argument that legal and mainstream structures continue to create systems that subjugate women and their bodies. However, reassessing feminists’ treatment of the female body will challenge some of the traditional analysis of and categorization of women as passive victims. The portrayal of women as passive victims already permeates feminist jurisprudence. For example, West states that:

27. See id. (“[C]oncurrent and separate from feminist debates on prostitution and pornography was a growing movement of political prostitutes, especially in North America and Western Europe . . . . Feminists who followed the anti-prostitution and anti-pornography line were often viewed by political prostitutes as naïve or self-righteous agents of control and condemnation. Prostitutes were viewed by the same feminists as either victims of abuse or collaborators with male domination.”). 28. Id. at 997 (reporting that Barry justified her refusal with the claim that the “conference was feminist and did not support the institution of prostitution”). 29. INT’L COMM. FOR PROSTITUTE’S RIGHTS, STATEMENT ON PROSTITUTION AND HUMAN RIGHTS (1986), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 998. 30. Robin West, The Difference in Women’s Hedonic Lives, 3 WIS. WOMEN’S L.J. 81, 85 (1987). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 185

[a]lmost all women, including those who have never experienced unwanted sex or battery, have experienced the fear of rape . . . . One way that (some) women respond to the pervasive, silent, unspoken, invisible fear of rape in their lives is by giving their sexual selves to a consensual, protective and monogamous relationship.31

On the other hand, some women do conquer their fears by making affirmative uses of their bodies in protest against societal restrictions, although they are often dismissed as “floozies.” Examples include American pop culture icons, such as Lil’ Kim32 and Madonna,33 as well as everyday mothers and sisters who challenge traditional views of sexuality through provocative dress and behavior. These women’s behavior may too easily be dismissed as being anti-feminist, or counter to traditional values. Across cultures, a woman’s worthiness and social acceptance is usually closely related to the way she chooses to express herself physically, for example, the way she dresses, her bodily expressions, etc. Similar to racial profiling, the process of judging a woman based on her clothes and bodily expressions, i.e. sexual profiling, marginalizes the profiled woman. Still, sexual profiling and its consequences in all spheres of life, including judicial lawmaking, continue to be less contested than racial profiling. Denouncing the negative stereotypes34 associated with women who choose to wear suggestive clothing is just as crucial as denouncing the stereotypes associated with urban black teenagers wearing baggy clothes. Both women and urban black men are, by virtue of their clothes and physical expressions, judged as being worthy of suspicion and deserving of harassment35 and, by extension, as being less worthy of legal protection. This rationale is demonstrated ad nauseum in rape cases36 and sexual harassment cases,37 where the clothing of the victim is often put at issue. The logic in such cases seems to be that certain types of self-expression, for example, sexual self-expression, are completely forbidden for women and that, if a woman chooses to disobey the norms, she is estopped

31. Id. at 103-04. 32. Lil’ Kim’s given name is Kimberley Jones. She is a female rapper who became known in the mid 1990s. She is known for her provocative lyrics and sexually suggestive clothing. At the 1999 MTV Music Awards, she appeared dressed in a lavender suit with one bare breast covered only by a matching pasty. 33. Madonna is a pop culture icon who is known for her controversial lyrics, provocative costumes, and daring behavior. 34. See generally BELL HOOKS, YEARNING: RACE, GENDER AND CULTURAL POLITICS (1990). 35. See, e.g., Elvira R. Arriola, “What’s the Big Deal?” Women in the New York Construction Industry and Sexual Harassment Law, 1970-1985, 22 COLUM. HUM. RTS. L. REV. 21, 22-57 (1990). 36. See, e.g., Sakthi Murphy, Comment, Rejecting Unreasonable Sexual Expectations: Limits on Using a Rape Victim’s Sexual History to Show the Defendant’s Mistaken Belief in Consent, 79 CAL. L. REV. 541, 545 (1991) (stating that rape, historically, has been treated differently from other crimes); see also Susan Estrich, Rape, 95 YALE L.J. 1087 (1986) (stating that sexism is inherently present and ingrained in Rape Law). 37. See e.g., Meritor Sav. Bank, FSB v. Vinson, 477 U.S. 57, 69 (1986) (“[W]hile ‘voluntariness’ in the sense of consent is not a defense to such a claim, it does not follow that a complainant’s sexual provocative dress is irrelevant as a matter of law in whether or not she found particular sexual advances unwelcome.”). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

186 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 from refusing access to her own body by anyone. As stated by Susan Estrich, rape trials often adjudicate “the appropriateness of the woman’s behavior according to male standards of appropriate female behavior”38 rather than according to the actual issues presented at trial. Mike Tyson’s and Kobe Bryant’s rape cases are two cases where such reasoning is illustrated. In Mike Tyson v. Indiana, the court greatly focused on the victim’s style of dress.39 Similarly, the alleged victim’s sexual history in Kobe Bryant’s case played a prominent role in the court documents’ description of the facts and in media speculations.40 In a third case, Commonwealth v. Killen, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that statements by the complainant that could be interpreted as sexually provocative “were not subject to the Rape Shield Law and were admissible in order to assist the jury in assessing the complainant’s credibility . . . .”41 This narrow interpretation of the Rape Shield Law begs the following question: What factors should be used to determine the relevancy of an alleged victim’s sexual conduct during and after the alleged incident? One commentator has said that in Killen “evidence existed tending to prove that the complainant was the aggressor and that following the alleged attack, she acted unlike an individual who had been raped.”42 What exactly is the appropriate behavior for a rape victim? If she becomes numb and does not fight off her aggressor, is she less worthy of protection? What if she initiates sex in the beginning and subsequently changes her mind: should she then be estopped from saying “no?”43 Or, if she engages in sexual contact after the alleged rape, does her rape claim become less valid? If the purpose of rape shield laws is to prevent a rape case from turning into an attack on the victim’s sexual history and reputation, how can that goal be accomplished when courts are now willing to admit what the law was designed to exclude? The Killen ruling ratifies the perception that a woman who chooses to have sex with more than one man would not have refused to have sex on the alleged occasion. While Killen certainly does not state that evidence of prior or

38. Estrich, supra note 36, at 1094. 39. Tyson v. Indiana, 619 N.E.2d 276, 282, 286 (Ind. Ct. App. 1993) (“Woman who exited from the backseat of the limousine was approximately 5’6” to 5’7” in height and was wearing a black mini skirt and a top which had a collar . . . [she was] an African-American woman with shoulder-length curly hair. . . [or] with tinted hair.”). 40. See Blaine Harden, Bryant Case is Called a Set-Back, WASH. POST, Sept. 3, 2004, at A08; see also, Bryant v. Colorado, No. 03 CR 204 (Eagle County Ct., Colo., Oct. 20, 2003) (preliminary hearing), available at http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/bryant/cobryant102003ord.pdf. 41. Commonwealth v. Killen, 680 A.2d 851, 854 (Pa. 1996). 42. Brian J. Golias, Note, Evidence – the Pennsylvania Rape Shield Law – Admissibility of Evidence Concerning Sexual Conduct Offered for Purposes of Impeachment, 35 DUQ. L. REV. 953, 971 (1997). 43. See Murphy, supra note 36, at 548 (“According to the traditional analysis, whether ‘no’ means ‘no’ depends on what kind of woman the victim is. A woman’s sexual lifestyle has always been one of the prime criteria for deciding whether her ‘no’ indeed means ‘yes.’ Thus, a ‘no’ from a ‘good girl’ might be respected, while a ‘no’ from a ‘bad girl’ might not. The dichotomy captures both the idea that sexually experienced women do not tell the truth and the idea that a woman who consents to sex once has a propensity to consent again and again.”). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 187 subsequent sexual conduct can be introduced if it has no probative value,44 it does open the door to more evidence being brought in under the rubric of relevancy. In other words, it opens the door to sexual profiling: using evidence of sexual behavior, unrelated to a specifically alleged crime, to serve as a proxy for determining an alleged victim’s credibility (and in essence her moral character). It is as if a woman’s unrelated sexual decisions are interpreted as giving a carte blanche to men, i.e. a free pass to that woman’s body. This is a continuation of the mainstream view that the law should only protect women who follow the model of chastity dictated by society. The discourse of the victim’s prior sexual experiences in the Kobe Bryant case resulted in the dismantling of her character and a complete negation of her honesty.45 Elizabeth Iglesias confirms that “feminists have long recognized that the dominant images of women represent us as mother, virgin, or whore. Indeed, many feminists have linked violence against women to the ways in which these images circulate in cultural narratives and the psychic structures of individual men and women.”46 These social constructions of women have isolated the female body from its inherent characteristic—that it is intrinsically, completely, and unilaterally a woman’s domain to dispose of at her sole discretion. Less attention has been paid to women’s symbolic expressions of resistance and liberation through their bodies. These forms of resistance are generally unpopular and run the risk of being viewed as perpetuations of patriarchy. However, they can be used as tools to combat sexism and the disenfranchisement of women. Welcoming these modes of resistance as legitimate feminist weapons will fortify the feminist movement and help overcome the misgivings and stereotypes that women themselves often carry about “proper uses” of the female body. Body protest is similar to the “outlaw culture” enunciated by Monica J. Evans in her analysis of the systematic way in which black women have used their positions at the margins to subvert discriminatory and oppressive norms.47 Evans describes outlaw culture as “the process by which African-Americans shift within and away from identities in response to mainstream legal systems and dominant culture” and “through which black women, develop and formalize strategies for coping with the terrifying exclusion of blacks from the protection of mainstream law.”48 Evans focuses on the way black women have traditionally defied mainstream culture and created their own cultures, outside

44. See Golias, supra note 42, at 971 (“One should not interpret Killen to mean that evidence of an alleged rape victim’s sexual conduct occurring during or after the alleged rape is admissible at trial even if such evidence has no probative value.”). 45. Elizabeth M. Iglesias, Rape, Race and Representation: The Power of Discourse, Discourses of Power, and the Reconstruction of Heterosexuality, 49 VAND. L. REV. 868, 886, 902 (1996) (discussing how the language around rape and implications behind the terms used have strategic implications and social meaning). 46. Id. at 902. 47. Monica J. Evans, “Stealing Away”: Black Women, Outlaw Culture and the Rhetoric of Rights, in CRITICAL RACE THEORY: THE CUTTING EDGE 500, 500-13 (Richard Delgado & Jean Stefancic eds., 2d ed. 2000). 48. Id. at 501. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

188 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 of the purview of the law, in order to obtain reprieve and remedies that the law could not provide for them. Evans describes such “outlaw women” as Harriet Tubman and Rosa Parks.49 Tubman was an outlaw woman because she dared to “disrupt the existing legal norms of property” and to “explode the boundaries of a destructive culture.”50 Similarly, Parks, and Claudette Colvin before her,51 became outlaw women when they refused to obey Jim Crow laws. These women used a reversal tactic that oppressed groups have often used throughout the world. They converted a behavior regarded as illegal and subversive into an instrument of power, hence, eventually reversing the legal definition traditionally associated with their actions. As a consequence, Tubman, who formerly would have been described as a contrabandist, and Parks, who would have been viewed as a troublemaker, have become two of the most celebrated women in American history. It is of great importance that these women who stood outside of the law were able to trigger legal change and reform. Using non-legal methods they brought people and behaviors traditionally located at the margins of the law within its purview, thereby, making them legal. This is a methodology that is still used by women today in their struggle for empowerment. This struggle is often misinterpreted by the mainstream and feminist theorists alike. Feminist scholar bell hooks’ criticism of feminist activists who denigrate women’s choice of heterosexuality 52 can be applied to some feminists’ blanket prejudice against the use of the body to negotiate rights. bell hooks purports that “feminist activists must take care that our legitimate critiques of heterosexism are not attacks on heterosexual practice. As feminists, we must confront those women who do in fact believe that women with heterosexual preferences are either traitors or likely to be anti-lesbian.”53 A similar admonishment should be issued regarding feminists’ view of female bodily expression. Underlying desires to appear proper and be accepted by the general mainstream have led some feminist activists to “de-gender”54 the female body and to perpetuate stereotypes regarding female bodily expressions. Such a characterization is dangerous, not only because it continues a tradition of denigrating the female body but also because it creates a schism between feminist scholars and the women existing and fighting at the margins of the law.

49. Id.; see also Stephanie L. Phillips, Claiming Our Foremothers: The Legend of Sally Hemmings and the Tasks of Black Feminist Theory, 8 HASTINGS WOMEN’S L.J. 401, 407-15 (1997) (discussing historical black female figures that have defied mainstream definition of who they should be ). 50. Evans, supra note 47, at 502. 51. Claudette Colvin is reported as the first African-American woman to defy Jim Crow and refuse to give up her seat on a public bus. As a result of her refusal, the fifteen-year-old was handcuffed and jailed. Colvin subsequently became part of Rosa Parks’ youth group. Parks then became the leading figure in the organized bus boycotts during the civil rights movement. E.g., Amanda Dawkins, Unsung Bus Boycott Hero Cite 50 Years Later, THE DECATUR DAILY NEWS (ONLINE EDITION), Feb. 6, 2005, http://www.decaturdaily.com/decaturdaily/news/050206/bus.shtml. 52. BELL HOOKS, FEMINIST THEORY: FROM MARGIN TO CENTER 148-58 (1984), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 929, 932. 53. Id. at 932. 54. De-gendering here refers to the process of rendering the female body less female and controversial (both in actual practice and in rhetoric) in order to achieve more social gains. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

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How can feminist theory truly address the inequalities suffered by women if feminists are disconnected from the realities faced by certain groups of women? Women’s struggle for control and domination of their bodies permeates all aspects of their lives. It is a constant struggle by women to force the world to respect and accept their own definitions of themselves, their bodies and their beings. This battle has not been given the appropriate attention or recognition because of feminist theory’s over-emphasis on “sameness/difference” theories. While such theories illustrate the existing conflicts between the sexes, they do not, however, fully explore the complexities of various and endless struggles carried on by women at different levels of our social echelons. In contrast, Regina Austin’s work examines body resistance by low-status black women.55 In order to resist societal classifications of adequate femininity and heterosexual norms of attractiveness, certain groups of black women have deliberately adopted non-conformist garments and physical behavior. Austin states that: The impact of the attack on the femininity and sexuality of low-status black female workers is quite broad . . . black women of any class who choose to look and act like they survive without a man experience a reproach that is not unrelated to the negative assessment of the beauty and sexuality of black women of low economic status. Racist heterosexism and fear of black lesbianism, within and without the black community, denigrate the sexuality and sensuality of black females who eschew the primping of the pampered and privileged and/or thrive as sexual beings within the orbit of a social order controlled by women. All of these modes of vilification seek to control more than black women’s sexual expression; in addressing how and for whose benefit we ought to work, they affect exploitation of our labor force.56 The extent to which feminist theory has co-opted mainstream definitions of femininity and female expression is hard to determine. Still, the influence of the dominant discourse regarding adequate forms of femininity” is widely reflected in feminist jurisprudence’s treatment of prostitution and pornography.57 While arguments targeting the arbitrary appropriation, domination, and subjugation of the female body are necessary, there is little room in these analyses for the acceptance of women’s choices, in addition to a reluctance to recognize a plurality of experiences. Feminists’ constant representation of the female prostitute as a misguided woman or as a victim negates the possibility that a “prostitute” or “pornographer” could be a valuable contributor to the women’s

55. Regina Austin, Black Women, Sisterhood and the Difference/Deviance Divide, 26 NEW ENG. L. REV. 877 (1992), reprinted in WOMEN AND THE LAW, supra note 22, at 973. 56. Id. at 977. 57. It should be noted that a few feminists have acknowledged the issue of agency in women’s use of their bodies in the context of pornography and prostitution. In addition, recently, two feminist authors presented an argument for prostitution as legitimate labor by the women who practice it. See Bertha Hernández-Truyol & Jane Lawson, Prostitution, Work, and Human Rights, Address at the Thomas Jefferson School of Law Fifth Annual Women and the Law Conference (Feb. 18, 2005), available at http://www.tjsl.edu/downloads/Her.pdf. However, there is still a general lack of recognition by feminist jurisprudence of the body as an effective tool against patriarchy. Fewer feminists still have advocated the use of the body as a type of symbolic speech that should be protected by legal systems, including certain instances of prostitution that involve women’s agency and are not controlled by men or the police. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

190 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 rights struggle. Rather, these women are portrayed as unwitting beings that better-knowing and more knowledgeable protectors, i.e., non-prostitute feminists, have to protect. This characterization creates a schism among women that prevents a consideration of women’s diverse needs. As stated by Shannon Bell: Prostitutes’ collective public demand for the legal right to be recognized as citizens just like all others is not a demand for equality in spite of difference but a demand for equality based on the distinct difference of being a prostitute. What lies just beneath the surface of the demand [is] . . . an affirmation of a ‘negative’ identity and a revaluation of values through the recognition of commercial sex as being just as valid and worthy as non-commercial sex.58 It would be counterproductive to continue to impose preconceived notions of proper feminist conduct or to continue assuming that certain modes of expression through the female body are inherently tainted and invalid. If the female body is dismissed as a non-legitimate tool in fighting patriarchy, isn’t feminist theory then saying that the female body’s only purpose is to perpetuate patriarchy?59 Feminist scholars confirm the stereotypes patriarchy attaches to the female body when limiting, even if implicitly, the female body’s role to that of a subject of patriarchy.

V. EXAMPLES OF LIBERATIVE USES OF THE FEMALE BODY BY WOMEN IN TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO AND THE CHALLENGES THEY FACE

A. History of Body Protest and Resistance by Trinidadian Women Women in Trinidad and Tobago have a long history of both overt and covert resistance.60 Located off the northeastern coast of Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago are twin Caribbean island states which were under English colonization until the 1960s. Intermittent occupation by the Spanish, French, and Portuguese, as well as the British, left influences of all four cultures in the language and customs of the people of the islands. Nonetheless, the dominant cultural influences in Trinidad stem from the remaining Amerindians in Trinidad, as well as the large African and Indian populations. Africans were brought to the two islands as a result of the slave trade and today, their descendants make up over a third of the population. Another forty percent consists of Indians who migrated to the island as indentured servants in the second part of the nineteenth century after the abolition of slavery in Trinidad.61

58. SHANNON BELL, READING, WRITING AND REWRITING THE PROSTITUTE BODY 101 (1994). 59. Pheterson, supra note 26, at 17 (“Women’s liberation movements throughout the world have not been immune to social, legal and ideological distortions of the lives of prostitutes . . . most contemporary feminists are isolated from women in the sex industry. A common misconception among feminists is the belief that women are protected by efforts to abolish prostitution . . . .”). 60. See generally PATRICIA MOHAMMED, GENDER NEGOTIATIONS AMONG INDIANS IN TRINIDAD FROM 1917-1947 (2002). 61. The Government of Trinidad & Tobago Government Online – General Information, http://visittnt.com/General/about/general.html (last visited Feb. 26, 2006). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

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This cultural diversity is instrumental when analyzing the ways in which Trinidadian women negotiate gender. While the feminist movement in Trinidad and Tobago has made tremendous gains since its inception in the 1940s, the gains have been limited by the faulty implementation of laws geared towards the protection of women.62 These faulty implementations are, however, not accidental but are rather the result of mainstream resistance to the idea of governmental regulations in favor of women. Where dominant groups are forced to accede to the demands of subjugated entities, it is common for these groups to create a legal system where deficient rules masquerade as legal rules that promote the formal equality of those who are subjugated.63 Paulette Pierce describes this subterfuge as a common response “by hegemonic classes to demands, from marginalized groups, for greater inclusion in modern systems of control and resource distribution.”64 Pierce labels this substitution as a “structural deflection” and “an adroit substitution of a formal equality for a true equality that would require fundamentally changing the way things are done, changing the goals of the organization, or both.”65 The enactment of Trinidad’s Domestic Violence Act and its subsequent faulty application in the court system is a perfect example of Pierce’s aforementioned “adroit substitution” of formal equality for true equality. Despite mainstream objections that the act was an attempt to criminalize “husband and wife business,” it was enacted. 66 Its enactment was a cause for celebration for women throughout the Caribbean region because it was symbolic of women’s gains over Trinidad’s entrenched patriarchal system. It is reported that “thousands of women from all over the country filed applications for

62. Rhoda Reddock reports that women’s organizations in Trinidad and Tobago flourished during the 1940s and 1950s due to better opportunities for women, as a result of the war and the establishment of universal suffrage in Trinidad in 1946. In Trinidad, education soon became the means for entrance into formerly exclusively male social arenas. As women gained more access to education, many women’s organizations developed, such as the Housewives’ Association of Trinidad and Tobago, the National Commission on the Skills of Women, Trinidad’s Women for Progress, and the Center for Gender Studies and Development at the University of West Indies in both St. Augustine, Trinidad and Mona, Jamaica. RHODA E. REDDOCK, WOMEN LABOUR & POLITICS IN TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO: A HISTORY 162 (1994). See also Patricia Mohammed, Reflections on the Women’s Movement in Trinidad: Calypsos, Changes and Sexual Violence, 38 FEMINIST REV. 33 (1991); Selwyn Ryan, Social Stratification in Trinidad and Tobago: Lloyd Braithwaite Revisited, in SOCIAL AND OCCUPATIONAL STRATIFICATION IN CONTEMPORARY TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO 58 (1991). 63. Formal equality here refers to the laws that purport to place women in the same status as men, but do not necessarily provide them with substantive equality. 64. Mindie Lazarus-Black, The (Heterosexual) Regendering of a Modern State: Criminalizing and Implementing Domestic Violence Law in Trinidad 28 L. & SOC. INQUIRY 979, 985 (2003), available at http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/LSI/journal/issues/v28n4/284001/284001.web.pdf (quoting Paulette Pierce, Boudoir Politics and the Birthing of a Nation: Sex, Marriage, and Structural Deflection in the National Black Independent Party, in WOMEN OUT OF PLACE: THE GENDER AGENCY AND THE RACE OF NATIONALITY 216, 228 (Brackette F. Williams ed., 1996)). 65. Id. 66. Id. at 994 (quoting TRINIDAD GUARDIAN, Mar. 10, 1991). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

192 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 protection as soon as the act became law.”67 Unfortunately, the law fell victim to patriarchal “cultural habits” present everywhere in Trinidad, including the courtrooms and the clerk offices. As a result, “the vast majority of applications for protection orders do not result in restraining orders.”68 In addition, as stated by Mindie Lazarus-Black, “when lawmakers and activists passed the Domestic Violence Act, they imagined a regendered state attuned to the problem of violence against women. As many anthropologists and linguists have shown, however, implementing rights and protections requires attention to everyday ideologies and practices of the culture at the courthouse.”69 To achieve the end of true equality, feminists should pay attention to the way in which formal equality may masquerade as true equality, as well as examine closely the ways in which women may masquerade feminist activism in everyday life. Poor Trinidadian women illustrate the power of an organic feminism in the way they choose to dispose of their bodies. From slavery to modern times, Trinidadian women have been able to maneuver around societal constraints and create their own sub-reality and sub-culture, both as a coping mechanism and as a way of asserting their independence and identity. Historically, they have used their bodies as liberating forces and as a means of obtaining political, societal, and sexual power. Such nontraditional behavior and clothing, displayed in settings such as dance halls and street carnivals, should inform a restructuring of Trinidadian jurisprudence. Afro-Caribbean women initially used masquerading, or “dressing up,” at Carnival to invent new social structures and/or reverse already existing ones.70 As Pamela R. Franco pointed out, dressing up is a “non-confrontational style that allows [Afro-Caribbean] women to be visible, not as objects, but as agents and producers of meaning in their performances.”71 Afro-Caribbean women who participated in early European-based celebrations were concerned with self-representation and symbolic repositioning, because they were unable to perform the masquerades of their homelands, which were representations of ancestors, guides and teachers in initiation ceremonies. Historians describe costumes, such as the French-Creole Martiniquan dress, with “elaborate underskirt . . . turban, foulard, and a profusion of jewelry” as a dress of “‘high affect’ juxtaposing highly contrasting colors and designs.”72 While these elaborate costumes resembled variations of the existing European style of dress, they were, in fact, used by Afro-Caribbean women “as public displays of rank and authority”73 rather than simple imitations of European women. Costumes were, thus, used by Afro-Caribbean women as encoded signs and masks that

67. Id. at 985 (quoting MERRI CREQUE, THE SHELTER FOR BATTERED WOMEN AND COAL AGAINST DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, A STUDY OF THE INCIDENCE OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO FROM 1991 TO 1993 (1995)). 68. Id. at 985. 69. Id. at 986. 70. See Pamela R. Franco, Dressing Up and Looking Good: Afro-Creole Maskers in Trinidad Carnival, 31 AFRICAN ARTS, Spring 1998, at 62, 62-96. 71. Id. at 63. 72. Id. at 64. 73. Id. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 193 helped recreate a social order in which they, an oppressed group, occupied positions of power. Indo-Trinidadian women had their own way of resisting dominance and traditional patriarchal norms. Indian women who came to the island as indentured servants had the unique opportunity to depart from the established gender roles perpetuated in their homelands. While gender inequity (in wages and treatment) certainly existed among indentured Indians, researchers suggest that at least “the system of indentureship did offer conditions under which [women] could earn an independent wage. The 1847 Immigration Ordinance granted . . . $2.40 to male Indians, $1.45 to female Indians . . .” 74 The capacity of women “to commodify their labour power in Trinidad . . . despite the lower value attached to their labour, must have provided a material base from which they could achieve a degree of economic independence.”75 While the immigrants and the regulators strove to maintain traditional family life, housing conditions created a close proximity that facilitated gender interactions and negotiations, especially for single men and women.76 Thus, “[a]way from the watchful eyes of parents and kin, women and men had the option of choosing from several willing partners. This was a fundamental break with the patriarchal tradition, where marriages were arranged by parents, and families kept intact by a host of kin relationships and duties.”77 To say that indentured women were given the chance to create new opportunities and break way from some of the patriarchal restraints does not negate the fact that these women were also physically vulnerable to rapes and crimes. Stemming from the belief that those women’s bodies belonged to men, there was a high incidence of rape and violence against women during their indentureship. Nonetheless, Indian women who migrated to Trinidad were still able to negotiate some advantages that rendered life on the island preferable to a return to India. A much higher percentage of Indian men than Indian women returned to India.78 This phenomenon seems to be in great part due to the fact that, while Indian men found it quite easy to resume their roles in Indian society on return to India, women were considered to have lost their caste or status in India and found it hard to readjust to life there.79 By leaving India, these women had already transgressed traditional female conduct and the new habits they adopted in the colony were unacceptable in the old setting.80 For example, in

74. MOHAMMED, supra note 60, at 43; see also Bridget Brereton, General Problems and Issues in Studying the History of Women, in GENDER IN CARIBBEAN DEVELOPMENT, 127 (Patricia Mohammed & Catherine Shepperd eds., 1988). Brereton notes that many Indian women came as single women instead of as wives and daughters and that such circumstances allowed them to slightly escape rigid classifications by earning and keeping their own wages. 75. MOHAMMED, supra note 60, at 43. See also Kapil Kumar, Rural Women in Oudh 1917-1947: Baba Ramchandra and the Women’s Question, in RECASTING WOMEN: ESSAYS IN COLONIAL HISTORY 337- 69 (Kumkum Sangari & Sudesh Vaid eds., 1989). 76. MOHAMMED, supra note 60, at 44 (“All Immigration Ordinances deemed it illegal to separate husbands and wives and children under the age of 15.”). 77. Id. 78. Id. at 50. 79. Id. 80. Id. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

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1893, “females who upon their arrival [to Trinidad] would veil their faces with their ornie at the approach of a man . . . [would] after some years’ residence in the colony, merely touch the ornie with the hand, and in many cases neglect to do so altogether.”81 Furthermore, many of the single Indian women who migrated to Trinidad did so in order to escape some form of societal constraint or difficulty in their lives and found in the island more freedom than in India. As a consequence, single Indian women often thought it was preferable to remain on the island at the end of their indenture than to go back home. This situation is illustrated by the greater reported numbers of women who attempted to secure return to Trinidad after returning to India than men.82 When settled in Trinidad, it is reported that the new Indo-immigrant women found many ways to carve out new identities and challenge the patriarchal structure. These new attempts at independence, however, often triggered violent responses from the male population.83 Indo-Caribbean women sometimes defied the established norms by changing sexual partners at will and by taking paramours of different races. These actions alarmed both the Christian missionaries and Indo-Caribbean men. When Sarah Morton, a missionary, narrated her conversation with Indo-Caribbean women on the issue of sexuality, she recorded her revolt at what she called the women’s sexual depravity: The loose actions and prevailing practices in respect of marriage here are quite shocking to the newcomer. I said to an East Indian woman whom I knew to be the widow of a Brahmin, ‘You have no relations in Trinidad, I believe?’ ‘No Madame, she replied, ‘only myself and two children; when the last immigrant ship came, I took a ‘papa.’ I will keep him as long as he treats me well. If he does not treat me well, I shall send him off at once; that’s the right way, is it not?’84 Some Indo-Caribbean women renegotiated their standing in relation to their male counterparts through the politics of the body. Setting the standards for appropriate treatment in male-female relationships, they defied the norms of patriarchy and Christianity by even indulging in polyandrous practices and interracial intercourse. Risking violence against them by their male counterparts,85 Indo-Caribbean women “continued to challenge normative

81. Id. at 50 (quoting DENNIS WOOD DEANE COMINS, A NOTE ON EMIGRATION FROM INDIA TO TRINIDAD 38 (1893)). 82. See MOHAMMED, supra note 60, at 52 (illustrating the efforts of Indian women’s return to Trinidad after being unable to reintegrate into Indian society with data that includes the correspondence of immigration officials. For example, a letter recorded in 1928 noted that an old emigrant woman, who emigrated to Trinidad in 1887 and returned to India in 1927, appeared at the immigration office in India and “stated that she was in great distress and wished to return to the colony”). 83. There were a great number of recorded of murders and “chopping” of women by men who became jealous either because a woman lover replaced them with another man or because he suspected her of romantic involvement another man. MOHAMMED, supra note 60, at 188-90. 84. Id. at 183 (quoting JOHN MORTON OF TRINIDAD 343 (Sarah Morton ed., 1916)). 85. Id. at 188 (“Even when the indentureship system ended . . . ‘crimes of passion’ persisted with some regularity . . . . In Chaguanas, an inquest was held into the death of Antee, an Indian woman, killed on the Montrose Estate on February 28, 1918. The verdict delivered by Mr. R.M. Van 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 195 expectations of Indian female sexuality and simultaneously redefine[d] femininity in the Trinidad-Indian context.”86 These indentured women shook the fabric of patriarchy in such a way that in 1916, a year before the end of indentureship, a group of indentured laborers filed a formal complaint against the actions of Indian women.87 The complaint specifically deplored the freedom Indo-women were able to exercise in their choice of sexual partners and the inability of their husbands, brothers, and fathers to prevent their actions. It stated in part: Is it plausible that those females desire to live as paramours with males of a different race to hers. Fathers nor husbands, nor brothers, who are their lawful protectors have power over them and are not in the least heard when such matters are brought before the authorities.88 As time passed, the number of Indian women on the island increased and patriarchal structures established a stronghold over Indo-Caribbean women’s lives on the island. Still, through body protest, Caribbean women continued to challenge normative concepts of sexuality and women’s roles in various arenas.

B. Body Protest and Resistance as Expressed in Modern Day Settings in Trinidad and Tobago Not only during Carnival do Trinidadian women appropriate and invert the dominant culture’s norms. Faced with the constraints of a male-dominated culture, Trinidadian women challenge social norms everyday at dance clubs and in neighborhood streets. Such metamorphoses are so convincing that it becomes difficult to determine where the performances end and reality begins. These women are also subject to great dangers because they are often viewed by the dominant class as loose and easy prey. Women, while literally masquerading by wearing costumes, also figuratively do so by adopting personas that normally would not be deemed acceptable by Trinidad’s patriarchal society. Masquerading in non-carnival settings takes various forms: from women dressing the part of the courtesan of old, to the sultry, sexually experienced, aggressive woman who defies society, to the woman who is completely in control of her own body and expresses it to every beat of the music. We see her

Buren, Senior Magistrate, was that the ‘woman came to her death by the severing of the spinal cord as a result of wounds inflicted by Lutcgmansingh who has since hanged himself’ . . . . In April 1919, Narinesigh, a middle-aged Indian man, was indicted for wounding one Jusoral on Thursday, October 27th at the San Pedro estate. The case for the Crown was that Narinesingh and Jusoral had been living together for a considerable period of time. She left him about four months before, having ‘transferred her affections’ to another Indian male. ‘On the day in question, the accused went to the house of his rival, called the woman out and inflicted a severe cut on her forehead. The cut went through a considerable portion of the bone and the brain matter was almost exposed’. . . . Men were sometimes also the victims of jealousy-motivated violence: “Jealous at the idea that his sweetheart had transferred her affections to another labourer on the Caroni estate, by the name of Stephen Rogers [most likely a non-Indian man], Dookie, one morning in July last, inflicted two severe wounds on Rogers with a brushing cutlass. Dookie giving evidence said ‘Rogers took away my wife . . . .’”). 86. Id. at 188. 87. Id. at 190. 88. Id. (quoting PETITION OF INDENTURED LABOURERS IN TRINIDAD (1916)). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

196 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 in the club, winding suggestively to calypso or reggae beat,89 overpowering her male partner with the thrust of her hips, becoming the pursuer. In sharp contrast to her domestic or professional identity, she becomes the sexual aggressor, through her explicit grinding and purposefully explicit sexual dancing, with and without a partner. In addition, she often uses the movements of her body to exert control over her male partner.90 For example, she might use speedy and strong hip movement to throw her male partner off balance. Consequently, we often see an inversion of the mating dance where the man becomes the hunted and the woman the powerful huntress. The male partner in the above scenario is overwhelmed by this contrary form of expression and does not truly understand the source of it, categorizing it as odd, licentious and problematic, even while fully participating in it. This adoption of traditionally masculine roles by women in these settings, of course, begs the question of whether this behavior ultimately benefits women or whether it simply duplicates the patriarchal system, thus, strengthening a system already oppressive to women. While it is certain that some women are simply mirroring a pattern of behavior learned from patriarchy, other women are attempting to carve out an identity that is in direct opposition to traditional Caribbean gender roles. Regardless of the actual cause of the behavior and of whether the masquerader is, in fact, the puppet of an omnipresent puppeteer, I contend that the masquerades that play out in these subcultural settings should inform a more women-centric reform of Trinidadian jurisprudence. Legal reform for women that recognizes women’s rights to sexual expression and control of their bodies, without oppression, abuse, and intervention by men, is imperative. Women’s attempts to forge a more complex identity seem to have gone unnoticed by Trinidadian jurisprudence. An exploration of criminal, family, and succession laws reveals that not only are the realities of women’s lives not addressed in Trinidadian jurisprudence, but also that some of their basic needs for legal protections are ignored.

VI. WOMEN’S BODY PROTEST AND RESISTANCE REVEALS NEED FOR WOMEN- CENTRIC REFORMS IN TRINIDADIAN JURISPRUDENCE Trinidadian jurisprudence is young and pregnant with possibilities for reform. The need for indigenous reforms that move away from the neutral language of English jurisprudence is evidenced by the fact that statutes do not

89. “To wind” is the verb in the English Caribbean that refers to the dance movements involving the lower part of one’s body. Winding is usually associated with socca, calypso and reggae (dance hall) music. 90. Trinidadian women’s attempt to control their bodies and resistance to patriarchy is also present in the socca songs of female Trinidadian artists. For example, such songs as “I’m Going to Kill You with My Wind Tonight” and “Carnival Is a Time for Freedom” by Saucie Wow and “Bonnie and Clyde” by Destra, all demonstrate Trinidadian women’s intent to resist patriarchal structures and defeating restrictions imposed on their bodies. In “Bonnie and Clyde,” for example, Destra specifically creates an ode to her rag as her sole reliable companion and rejects the presence of any male companion in a desire to remain autonomous. Similarly, when performing, Saucie Wow traditionally invites a man to the stage and unfailingly overpowers him physically, thus, publicly shaming any attempt he makes at controlling her body. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 197 address Trinidad-specific problems experienced by women in the region. In examining Trinidadian jurisprudence in relation to women, this article is divided into two categories: first, a look at aspects of Trinidadian law that are facially discriminatory towards women and, second, an analysis of the aspects of Trinidadian law that are facially neutral, but are discriminatory in their application of the law. A wide variety of laws in Trinidad are facially discriminatory. Because of the rise in rape cases in Trinidad, the first category of great concern includes rape laws. Rape and violence against women in Trinidad is, by all accounts, at an all-time high. Marital rape was only recently outlawed in Trinidad.91 The recent presence of this act on the books is chilling, not only because it reveals the lack of protection afforded to married women, but because of the statement it made about Trinidadian society’s views of women’s bodies. This law disregarded women’s ability to consent to sex and their right to control their own body after marriage. The rationale underlying this statute was flawed and its reasoning tacitly condoned other acts of physical violence against women. It also ratified the domestic abuser’s feeling of entitlement to commit acts of violence against women’s bodies.92 The legal definition of rape in Trinidad still seems to favor the perspective of the accused over the perspective of his alleged victim. A case that is the seminal precedent for determining consent in rape cases states that: Rape is not a word in the use of which lawyers have a monopoly and the question to be answered in this case, as I see it, is whether according to the ordinary use of the English language a man can be said to have committed rape if he believed that the woman was consenting to the intercourse and would not have attempted to have it but for his belief, whatever his grounds for so believing. I do not think that he can. 93 The problem with consent being established subjectively is that it mutes the women’s voice and negates the possibility that she might have withdrawn her consent. Another example of gender bias in the actual drafting of the law is seen in Trinidad’s statutory rape laws. Strict liability is applied to statutory rape crimes

91. Press Release, Comm. on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women Concludes Consideration of Trinidad and Tobago Report, U.N. Doc. WOM/1316 (Jan. 29, 2002). 92. See Leela Ramdeen, Eliminating Violence Against Women, TRINIDAD GUARDIAN (ONLINE EDITION), Nov. 22, 2004, available at http://www.guardian.co.tt/archives/2004-11-22/Leela Ramdeen.html. 93. Director of Public Prosecutions v. Morgan, [1976] A.C. 182 (H.L.), available at http://www.nuigalway.ie/law/Common%20Files/larry_donnelly/nameMorgan_and_rape_.rtf (emphasis added) The court held that where a defendant had sexual intercourse with a woman without her consent but believing she did consent, he was not guilty of rape even though he had no reasonable grounds for his belief: Mr. Morgan brought three men from a pub to his home and requested that they have intercourse with his wife. Mr. Morgan told the men to ignore his wife’s protests or resistance, saying his wife was “kinky.” The men forcibly overcame the wife’s resistance and each penetrated her without her consent. The three men were charged with rape. Though charged with aiding and abetting the men, the husband was not charged with rape because the marital immunity was thought to apply. See id. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

198 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 committed against girls age thirteen and younger, but not to statutory rape crimes committed against girls between fourteen and eighteen.94 The law thereby treats young women as sexual actors and sees them as active contributors to their fate, no matter how immature they may be. The law may be so written in part because sexual involvement by men with girls as young as twelve is so high in the Caribbean that legislators are either reluctant to change the status quo or perhaps because they view sexual involvement with minors as acceptable. Furthermore, sexual offenses such as abducting unmarried girls under age fourteen, as well as “attempting to procure any girl . . . not being a common prostitute, or of known immoral character, to have unlawful carnal connection” are only punishable by two years in prison.95 Additionally, the age of consent for a female minor’s ability to contract marriage can be as low as twelve years old.96 This rule might speak specifically to the diverse racial makeup of Trinidad’s population. The ethnic makeup of Trinidad and Tobago is 39.6% African descent and 40.3% East Indian descent, with rest of population being of mixed, European and Asian descent.97 Traditionally, arranged marriages at a young age have been common in several of these communities and might explain the Trinidadian legislature’s decision to set the age of consent at twelve-years old. Abortions are illegal in Trinidad, except to protect the life or health of the mother; those who are found guilty of procuring an abortion can be imprisoned for up to four years.98 Despite its being illegal, the abortion rate in Trinidad is thought to be higher than in the United States, and abortion has turned into a lucrative business for those willing to perform them.99 The issue of whether women should have access to legal abortions is a delicate subject in a deeply Catholic and religious country. However, giving women the right to legal abortions would raise the standard for legal protections granted to Caribbean women, because it would recognize that women should be the sovereign of their bodies. There is also a need for a revision to common law marriages in Trinidad and Tobago. While great strides have been made in allowing Caribbean women in common law unions to obtain maintenance or inheritance rights, this legislation is not reflected in the day-to-day realities many Caribbean women face. Currently, the law recognizes common law unions as valid unions that entitle women to both maintenance and inheritance rights if they can prove

94. Offenses Against the Person Act, 1990, c. 11:08 § 32 (Trinidad & Tobago). 95. Offenses Against the Person Act, 1990, c. 11:08 §§ 37, 48 (Trinidad & Tobago). 96. U.N. Comm. on the Rights of a Child, State Party Report – Trinidad and Tobago, U.N. Doc. CRC/C/11/Add.10 (Feb. 16, 1996) (stating that under the Muslim Marriage and Divorce Act, c. 45:02, a girl may marry at 12 and a boy at 16, and that under the common law, the ages are 12 for a girl and 14 for a boy). 97. The Government of Trinidad & Tobago Government Online – General Information, available at http://visittnt.com/General/about/general.html (last visited Feb. 26, 2006). 98. Offenses Against the Person Act, 1990, c. 11:08 §§ 56-57 (Trinidad & Tobago). 99. Paul Nowak, Planned Parenthood Targets Trinidad and Tobago to Legalize Abortion, TTGAPAPERS.COM, Aug. 10, 2004, http://www.ttgapers.com/Article801.html. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 199 cohabitation for an extended period of time.100 However, the legislature has failed to address the existing problem of men having more than one common law union, frequently in addition to being legally married. Where a decedent leaves multiple common law wives, they presumably must compete for the label of sole wife at the death of their common law husband. Trinidadian jurisprudence, thus far, has been blind to the de facto polygamy that exists in the Caribbean and, consequently, has failed to hold men legally responsible for their actions. In addition to facially discriminatory laws, Trinidad and Tobago has many laws that are gender-neutral, but are applied in a discriminatory way by the courts. Trinidad and Tobago’s constitution supports the equality of all citizens under the law and the legislature has in many ways attempted to pass laws that would insure equality between the sexes. Why, then, are Trinidadian women still subordinated and subjected unequal treatment even in the face of the laws? One of the reasons lies in the current inefficiency of the legal machinery in Trinidad. Mindie Lazarus-Black asserts that the failure of the domestic violence laws in Caribbean countries to provide meaningful protection to its victims of domestic violence is due to four factors: (1) the sheer number of protection applications that are filed, (2) the fact that few applications actually result in extended protections, (3) the fact that the majority of applications are withdrawn or dismissed, and (4) the considerable time commitment required to resolve these cases, which often means that women need to take a lot of time off work if they actually want to prevail.101 Another challenge to obtaining adequate legal protections for women in Trinidad lies in the court system’s lack of organization and lack of a proper method of tracking the cases in the court system.102 In this context, it is very easy for members of subordinate classes, such as women, to get discouraged and eventually decide against pursuing the case. The fact that the system is so disorganized speaks volumes about how little importance members of the legal system accord to domestic violence cases. In addition to their inefficiency, women seeking remedies from the courts have to deal with intimidation, the humiliation factor of having their personal lives on trial, the effects of judicial discretion (which is often formed by the decision-maker’s own bias and socialization), and the numerous second chances given by courts to their abusers.103 These inherent flaws in the proper application of the law reveal a need for gender reform to take place not only in the laws, but also in the attitudes of the population.

100. Suzanne Shephard, How TT’s Laws Cover Common-Law Unions, NEWSDAY (Trinidad & Tobago), Jan. 22, 2006, http://www.newsday.co.tt/stories.php?article_id=32708. 101. See Mindie Lazarus-Black, The Rites of Domination: Tales From the Domestic Violence Court (The Ctr. for Gender & Dev. Studies, Working Paper No. 7, 2002). 102. The author personally witnessed the difficulties presented by the courts’ case indexing system when she went to the courthouse and was not able to find a case after nearly an hour, despite the presence of numerous clerks. This inefficiency might also point to the problems created by the digital divide that exists between the Caribbean and wealthier nations like the United States. 103. Lazarus-Black, supra note 101, at 14-16. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

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VII. REFORM PROPOSAL To reform the traditional English law-based Caribbean system, a new generation of Trinidadian women must lobby lawmakers to make greater use both of indigenous concepts of identity and concepts of gender equality. In order to accomplish this, both men and women will have to be educated about how law is both made and applied,104 so that they can organize grassroots reformation movements to promote change. While women’s rights movements, led by such scholars as Rhoda Reddock and Patricia Mohammed, have been somewhat successful, feminist activism in Trinidad should not be limited to an educated class of women “helping” less educated ones. Combined efforts to recognize the potential contributions of women from all social spheres will not only create a healthy, egalitarian, feminist movement in Trinidad but will also put more pressure on the male-dominated legislature to represent women’s interests.105 Furthermore, there is an urgent need to infiltrate the political system in Trinidad and implement ways of holding the legislators accountable for their indifference towards women’s concerns. Lobbying and forceful protests against politicians’ decisions might force them to enact useful, women-centric laws in a quicker fashion. Such lobbying has worked in the past, causing the passing of the Domestic Violence Act in Trinidad. It can still work today. It is important to show lawmakers that the majority of women are unhappy with the laws. Both male and female attorneys should advance woman-centric, equitable arguments in court documents without fear that they will not be taken seriously by the judges or that they will be labeled as being too sensitive. However, a new generation of women attorneys will be instrumental in advocating for change inside and outside of the courtrooms. Many professional women in Trinidad readily admit that they experience oppression from the “good ole boy” network in the legal profession. Breaking the vicious cycle of that network will entail a continuing and constant denunciation of its existence and its nefarious effects.

VIII. CONCLUSION Body protest is not particular to a country or region. Sexism and patriarchy are problems that are inherent to all societies and legal systems are commonly unable to protect the women who contest the status quo. Thus, it is not surprising that we find varieties of these inadequacies both in the U.S. and in international settings. Throughout the world, some women use body-inspired tools to renegotiate society’s restrictive and oppressive gender definitions. Exploring such uses, however, demands that we eradicate preconceived traditional notions and learn to appreciate the potential utilitarian and redemptive functions of body politics. Body protest demonstrates that the

104. See generally Stephen Heath, Male Feminism, in MEN IN FEMINISM 1 (Alice Jardine & Paul Smith eds., 1987); see generally ENGENDERING MEN: THE QUESTION OF MALE FEMINIST CRITICISM (Joseph A. Boone & Michael Cadden eds., 1990). 105. While this comment is made specifically regarding women in Trinidad, the abolishing of the divide between social spheres among women as well as the sameness/deviant divide enunciated by Regina Austin would benefit feminist’s movements worldwide and maximize our efforts. 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

BODY PROTEST 201 female body is a symbol loaded with meaning and that its use can constitute protected speech. Body protest is evoked in the context of Trinidad’s traditional custom of masquerading because the terms “body protest” and “masquerade” both refer to the presentation of physical elements which mask underlying messages and social commentaries. The purpose of discussing Trinidadian women’s “body protest” is not to portray Trinidad’s gender issues as being unique, but to demonstrate how these women’s symbolic actions constitute feminist activism. Trinidad is yet but one example where these types of struggles take place daily. The goal is for all those who are committed to “global feminism” to find ways to exert pressure on local governments so as to obtain more legal protections for these types of protests. This article recognizes that while countries are currently in various stages of the struggle for women’s rights, women’s use of their bodies for resistance and redemptive functions need to be accepted by all legal systems in order for women to be adequately protected. Furthermore, this article proposes that social gains often occur from “the bottom up”106 and that self-expression by women from lower economic classes often exposes the needs and problems that all women face. The failure of some feminist scholars to consider the redemptive qualities of using the female body denotes that they, too, have internalized patriarchal classifications of women’s bodies. Feminist theory must overcome its own biases about women’s use of their bodies. Female bodily expression has generally been associated with eroticism, which is a concept that is “often . . . misnamed by men and used against women.”107 Eradication of these biases will remove a monumental obstacle to trans-cultural, trans-economic coalition- building among women. Recognizing the female body’s redemptive functions is important because such a process will ultimately facilitate collaboration between more women. Being more inclusive (both domestically and internationally) of various groups of women will create a stronger feminist task force. The changes proposed will not take place overnight and will necessitate cross-cultural and cross-generational coalition-building. A study of law-making in American jurisprudence shows that legal changes occur over long periods of time as a result of social, political and international pressure.108 This recipe may also apply to Trinidad. This does not mean that American standards and views should be forced on other countries, but that women activists from throughout the world should team up to help each other push through reforms that would increase women’s rights. The success of these coalitions will depend on feminist theorists’ ability to accept and understand non-traditional forms of resistance to patriarchy and the struggles of women who live at the margins of society. Understanding non traditional tools of resistance, like the female body, will not

106. Mari Matusda, Looking to the Bottom: Critical Legal Studies and Reparations, in CRITICAL RACE THEORY: THE KEY WRITINGS THAT FORMED THE MOVEMENT 63, 63 (Kimberlé Crenshaw et al. eds., 1996). 107. Lorde, supra note 2, at 54 (stating that these stereotypes have led us to “turn[] away from the . . . erotic as a source of power and information . . .”). 108. See Mary L. Dudziak, Desegregation as a Cold War Imperative, in CRITICAL RACE THEORY: THE CUTTING EDGE 106, 106-08 (Richard Delgado & Jean Stefancic eds., 2d ed. 2000). 08_ALEXANDRE.DOC 4/28/2006 8:56 AM

202 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER LAW & POLICY Volume 13:177 2006 only facilitate a greater discourse among women internationally but also reinvigorate the domestic feminist movement.